and lad baby bag the christmas numberi spot for a fifth time giving them more number one singles than the beatles. more than two hundred million people in america, are under extreme weather alerts, and more than one and a half million people have no power, as temperatures in some areas are predicted to drop, to as low as minus 45 celsius. an arctic storm is approaching, predicted to hit canada. and extend down to the deep south and the border with mexico, including texas. our north america correspondent, john sudworth, has more. it couldn t have come at a worse time. america s peak travel season hit by a once in a generation storm. two days before christmas, two thirds of the country are now under extreme winter weather alerts stretching from here on the canadian border all the way to florida. on airport runways planes have been replaced by de icing trucks. we re out here, period. i mean, we ll be out him until it stops snowing, really. ..leading to thousands of cancelled f
whereas as you say, this leaked information, 37 million on a single day. in terms of the strain, do we know which strain is working to the chinese population and do we know if that is spreading globally? is likely to be in omicron varian spreading through china we varian spreading through china may think there me overestimating we may think there may be overestimating asymptomatic cases but without further information, that number seems quite unlikely and if that was the case, will be expecting around 700,000 deaths 12 around 700 , 000 deaths 12 occurred around 700,000 deaths 12 occurred on this month alone. which is much higher than what we have seen officially reported in india over the whole course of the pandemic and so, really quite mixed numbers coming out of china. in
whereas as you say, this leaked information, 37 million on a single day. in information, 37 million on a single da . , ., , ., ., day. in terms of the strain, do we know which day. in terms of the strain, do we know which strain day. in terms of the strain, do we know which strain is day. in terms of the strain, do we know which strain is working to i day. in terms of the strain, do we. know which strain is working to the chinese population and do we know if thatis chinese population and do we know if that is spreading globally? is likely to be in omicron varian spreading through china and very transmissible variant within china and will be other countries is perhaps multiple images circulating at the same time and similar transmissibility and what is happening in china at the moment, there are reports that there are increasing genome sequencing but they are not making the publicly available on a global level and so, we do not have access to that but what is happening in similar
joining me now is economist and author duncan weldon. plan b was not successful in the first place that was a mistake. so we did have a way forward in terms of vaccinating our population and it strikes me as a real risk because we are starting to see increases of cases and other age groups, which could mean that this epidemic starts plateauing much as we saw last autumn. ,., ., autumn. the government are led by the health minister autumn. the government are led by the health minister when autumn. the government are led by the health minister when they i autumn. the government are led by the health minister when they gave | the health minister when they gave their presentation earlier in the day. they talked about that balance of risk and said the justification is that the omicron varian is retreating here in the uk. what do you make of that? i retreating here in the uk. what do you make of that? you make of that? i don t think viruses retreat or you make of that? i don t think